


‘Something he could control’

by CriticalCXGShipped



Category: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (TV)
Genre: Childhood Trauma, College, Eating Disorders, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-01
Updated: 2018-04-01
Packaged: 2019-04-16 17:25:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14169870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CriticalCXGShipped/pseuds/CriticalCXGShipped
Summary: Why does Nathaniel control his eating so much?  What was his week with mono like? What was his weird theatre nerd roommate like?  How did Nathaniel Plimpton Snr respond to the mono?





	‘Something he could control’

I’m fine dad, just had a touch of mono’ Nathaniel said.

‘Your cousin called and said you missed a whole week of classes!’ Intoned his father, his voice booming down the phone line.

‘I’m taking all the same assignments, just doing it from my dorm room’ protested Nathaniel. He had noticed his father didn’t look kindly on his employees taking days off work but mono was mono. Even if it didn’t completely wreck your immune system and exhaust you, it was highly infectious and it was bad form to spread it all over Stanford law school.

‘The nurse has quarantined me pop, em, Father, and I’m hitting the books much harder than usual’ Nathaniel tried to say smoothly, bracing himself for fireworks and ridicule like he had every time he got sick ever since he was a child.

There was silence on the line and he could hear the tinkle of ice in Nathaniel Plimpton 2nd’s whiskey glass.

‘Is that lunch, Father?’ Asked Nathaniel the 3rd in a moment of courage.

‘You don’t need lunch everyday, son, that’s a myth, or breakfast, I am in control of my body. Just keep getting those good grades. Your mother sends her regards’ and he heard the murmur of the dial tone.

Nathaniel put the phone on the cradle. He was glad his father couldn’t see him now, in sweats, surrounded by Gatorade bottles, empty soup bowls, medicine and Harry Potter books. He wasn’t studying at all. The truth was he was so wiped out that he had barely gotten up that day.

How’s the old man? How is Voldemort himself?’ James called from the other room, the sound of one of his musicals he was rehearsing for playing on the CD player.

‘By the way, you’re going to have to sterilise those when you’re done’ James popped his curly head around the door.

‘You’ve had mono’ Nathaniel said flatly, his face buried in the pages of ‘The Prisoner of Azkaban’ flipping over another page.

‘Yeah but I don’t want all the babes I bring back here getting it when they touch the spines’ James’ skinny, awkward arms gestured towards the shared bookshelf under which Nathaniel had set his bed up. Within an arms reach, he could use the phone, the tv and access the next Harry Potter without walking or even standing up.

‘You wish’ Nathaniel shook his head. He felt himself become so tired and drowsy and fell asleep with the book on his chest, half finished.

The week passed in a blurr of Wendgardium Leviosa, tins of soup consumed, crazy, feverred dreams of Voldemort. Later, shining cups that turned into teleport keys, wands and late night viewings of Grease or some other musical theatre thing his roommate insisted on watching while he drifted in an out of sleep in his sweaty, replusive sheets, too tired to move.

A week later, a thinner Nathaniel strode across campus, his pants loose around his waist and legs, even with his belt up a few notches.

He caught sight of his face in a window, his cheeks looked hollow and defined, his jaw sharp, collarbones visible. He liked what he saw.

His father was going to be furious with his marks on that test he just took, he had read the whole series of Harry Potter in a week and was desperately behind on Torts, but he was pretty sure he has gotten through, just.

He couldn’t please his father.

‘Hey, Nathaniel! Good to see you buddy!’ Aaron, his friend from high school came over eating a burrito.

‘Wow! You look fit man!’ Aaron slapped Nathaniel’s flat stomach. ‘They have these burritos at the cart over there, you gotta try one’ he gestured at a cart on the green near the admin building.

Nathaniel’s stomach growled, he hadn’t eaten much at all this week. It felt good.

‘Nah. Thanks man, I already ate. Wanna go for a swim later?’ He asked casually.

A long swim and a salad for dinner and he would be downgrading to his thin pants. That was something he could control.


End file.
